208 MALACOPTERYGII. — CYPRINID^. 



as far as we know, in the northern division, both 

 of the one and the other hemisphere. Of this great 

 host, one hundred and twenty-five species are 

 marked by Bonaparte as European, and twenty are 

 found, in greater or less abundance, in British 

 waters. Austria and Prussia are the chief Carp 

 countries in Europe, but the streams of tem- 

 perate and southern Asia constitute the great 

 home of the group. 



Among the twenty native species are some of 

 the fishes most familiar to anglers ; such as the 

 Carps proper (of which there are three kinds), the 

 Gold-fish of our parlours and reservoirs, the 

 grovelling and wallowing Barbel, the Gudgeon, 

 the slimy Tench, the three kinds of Bream, the 

 crimson-finned Roach, the silvery Dace and 

 Grayling, the " logger-head Chub," the golden 

 Rudd, the Bleak, whose scales are used in making 

 artificial pearls, and the brilliant little Minnow, 

 the desire and delight of truant school-boys. 



Genus Cyprinus, (Linn.) 



The true Carps, which are numerous, have the 

 lips fleshy and moderately thick, but not plaited 

 nor notched ; there are sometimes small cirri or 

 tentacles at the corner of the mouth ; the jaws 

 are of equal length. The dorsal is lengthened, 

 with the first and second rays bony ; the second 

 ray of this fin, as well as the first of the anal, 

 is cut into strong teeth along its hinder edge. 



The fleshy tubercles which are found attached 

 to the lips of some of the Carps, occasionally 

 produced into cirri or beards, and which, in the 

 Barbels, an allied genus, are large and conspicu- 



